Thursday, 21st September 2006 at 20:38

Recap article: News from 12th September 2006.
The "key visual" - a Disneyland Resort Paris tradition and a hugely important tool in the marketing of new product. With so many new things on the horizon we'd better prepare for a slew of Disney propaganda, beginning right now with the key visuals for the two new Toon Studio attractions, Crush's Coaster and Cars Race Rally...,

So far only released in a small resolution on the official travel marketing tools website Extraordinet, the visuals mainly use elements of the movie posters for Finding Nemo and Cars, with the Cars Race Rally image appearing as little more than a slightly photoshopped version of its one-sheet.

The Crush’s Coaster image, on the other hand, is more original but perhaps confusing to those unfamiliar with the new family spinning coaster and dark ride. The visual shows a winding U-shaped track similar to that of Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster starring Aerosmith, rather than the flatter design of the actual Maurer SÃ¶hne track. The corkscrew nature of the track, covered in quickly duplicated images of characters from the film, could also hint at inversions and a higher thrill level than the actual attraction. Despite this, the visual is fresh and colourful and, along with its Cars Race Rally friend, will likely do good work for the resort in advertising these two exciting attractions.

Both visuals feature the classic Disneyland Resort Paris logo (rather than the new 15th Anniversary version) on signposts themed to a harbour sign and billboard respectively. Strangely, they also both feature the castle, Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant, rather than the Earful Tower landmark of Walt Disney Studios.

The large black space in the Cars Race Rally visual hints at either a lack of creativity or a pre-designated space for the attraction logo. Indeed, after quickly adding logos to the two visuals they immediately become far more balanced and rather attention-grabbing…

Fans of Dory, the legendary Blue Regal Tang from Finding Nemo, should perhaps not smile too soon, though. After a total non-appearance in every single piece of concept art for the attraction, she has also failed to appear in this visual. Her popularity is so strong that, if she is featured in the attraction, you’d think they’d use her heavily on the advertisement too, right?

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